


Nihilists In Love

by lifeofsnark



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Family Drama, Seriously It's Weird, Sexual Content, destination wedding AU, in the most middle school way, p in v, so much dialogue, the least erotic sex scene ever, they're both snarky nihilists, who like each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 11:25:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17745056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifeofsnark/pseuds/lifeofsnark
Summary: A Destination Wedding (2018) AUWhen Poe called off their engagement four years ago, Rey promised him that she'd go to his hypothetical future wedding to show that there weren't any hard feelings. Now his wedding is actually happening, and he had the gall to hold it on a remote estate in Georgia. To top everything off, she finally meets Ben Solo, Poe's cousin/sort-of brother, and he's not as much of an asshole as everyone always said.He's worse.Unfortunately, she's starting to kind-of like him.~~~~“I don’t think sex is like a bicycle,” Rey said. “It doesn’t all come back.”“Yeah,” said Ben, rolling his shoulders. “I don’t think I’ve experienced real pleasure since the economic crash.”“You enjoyed that?” asked Rey, horrified.“No,” said Ben. “It was just a coincidence that my sexual economy tanked along with the global recession.”“Jesus,” Rey mumbled, leaning in to kiss him again.





	1. Friday

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all! I usually don’t do introductory author’s notes as I think the work should be able to stand on its own. In this case… well, I have some explaining to do. 
> 
> The first thing you need to know is that this is a Destination Wedding AU, based on the 2018 film with Winona Ryder and Keanu Reeves. (I know. I KNOW. I love them.) This movie is quirky and fun, but there’s one great big gag I need to tell you right now:
> 
> There are only two speaking parts in the whole damn film, and those belong to Winona and Keanu. Seriously. Nobody else speaks. It’s just them bickering for an hour. It’s great.
> 
> I’ve used the same gag here. This is essentially 14k words of snarky back-and-forth between middle-aged-ish Ben and Rey while at a wedding in rural Georgia. If you’re still on board, please enjoy!

So far nothing had gone horribly wrong, which meant that, by Rey’s standards, it was a pretty good day. She’d finished cataloging evidence and had turned it over to the paralegal, Jerry hadn’t tried to ask her out (again), and her _Sedum clavatum_ were putting out roots into the propagation tray. She’d even gotten a window seat on the shitty little pondhopper that was going to take her from Atlanta to Athens, Georgia.

 

More and more passengers boarded, the plane slowly filling up, and the seat next to her still hadn’t been claimed. Maybe-

 

Nope.

 

A giant man in a pretty good suit walked onto the plane, scanned the seat numbers, and locked eyes with Rey. He had dark hair that, though neatly parted, waved down well over the collar of his shirt. He had to be six foot three, and when he wedged himself down into the seat beside her (these little planes were built for fairy people, jesus) he smelled expensive.

 

He also knocked her elbow off the seat rest.

 

“Excuse you,” said Rey, scooting herself in closer to the window.

 

“Sorry,” said the tall guy.

 

Rey watched out of the corner of her eye as he reached into his suit pocket, pulled out a kindle paperwhite, and started to read. As he settled in, he knocked her arm off the rest, _again._

 

“Thanks,” he said, spreading out even more.

 

“I was using that,” said Rey. She’d made a New Year’s resolution to take less shit, and even though it was June and she’d already walked away from too many opportunities to stand up for herself, she could try, goddammit.

 

“You get the window,” said the big guy, not looking away from his book. In profile he looked like the back of a Roman coin, all haughty forehead and patrician nose and square-edge jawline. “If there’s a middle seat, they get the central armrests, and the aisle gets the left. Because there’s no central seat, the armrest defaults left. To me.”

 

“Oh, fuck off,” said Rey. “This is just another example of men’s assumption that public spaces belong to them! It’s man-spreading, but with your elbows!”

 

“There’s a system,” said the guy again.

 

“Yeah, that you made up.”

 

“So? Everything is made up. Language is made up. Eventually it becomes the system, and then people forget that it was ever just ‘made up’.”

 

“Sure,” said Rey, rolling her eyes and looking out the window. Prick.

 

The sat on the tarmac for god only knew how long. The overhead fans were blowing, but only lukewarm air was coming out. As a countermeasure to southern summer heat, it was about as effective as the last rattling _mea culpa_ of an unrepentant sinner.

 

One of the stewardesses went up to the front and unhooked the little radio from the wall. It was stupid, thought Rey. This stupid plane is the size of a school bus, we could hear her, but _no,_ she has to go and use the radio. It was the (completely expected, yet) dreaded delay announcement, and Rey’s seatmate groaned.

 

“I can’t believe I took a half day off work for this,” he said.

 

Rey huffed. She knew this guy was entitled, but _god._ “It’s not their fault the plane is late.”

 

“It is- this is their job. They are to safely get planes and their cargo, namely human passengers, to and from their destinations in a timely manner. That’s it. That’s their job.”

 

“Well there’s no point in being mad about something you have no control over,” said Rey. She really ought to pull out the work papers she’d brought to read on the plane, but you can’t just let guys like this walk through the world unchecked. It made their egos even bigger.

 

“Really?” he asked. “Then when are we supposed to get mad? If we had enough control over a situation to change it, being angry really would be pointless.”

 

“Fine,” said Rey, reaching down to fiddle around in her purse. “Be angry. See if I care.”

 

The stewardess came by with her little cart of lukewarm sodas and a sweaty bucket of ice. Each cup got a measly two cubes. Rey had ginger ale, and the asshole next to her took a coke.

 

“So why are you going to Athens, Georgia?” he asked.

 

“I’m actually going to Corellia Hall. It’s towards Monroe.”

 

She saw his fingers tighten on his little plastic cup of Coke.

 

“Please tell me you’re a musician,” he said. “Or a chef.”

 

“What?” _Why the hell did he care what she did for a living?_ “Why?”

 

“Because if you aren’t a musician or a caterer or some other staff member, it means we’re both wedding guests, and I’m going to have to see you again.”

 

Rey could feel her eye twitching. “I’m not a caterer.”

 

“Fuck,” the still-nameless asshole muttered. “Which groom are you here for?”

 

“Poe,” said Rey. She ran her palms over the thighs of her trousers. It was cool- she could do this. He’d find out anyway, so might as well rip the bandaid off now. “I was engaged to him for like, ten minutes. It was years ago, now.”

 

 _Four years and three months,_ she thought to herself. Precision counted.

 

“Oh my god,” said the big guy, swiveling to look at her straight-on for the first time. “You’re Rey.”

 

“Yes, I’m Rey Johnson. And you are…?” They’d been sitting here for forty minutes and he _still_ hadn’t introduced himself. Asshole indeed.

 

“I’m Ben Solo.”

 

“You’re the cousin-turned-brother!” said Rey. This was answering so many questions. “Poe lived with you guys for what, eight years? I was engaged to him for a year and I never even met you!”

 

They’d finally closed the doors to the planes, and up front the stewardess was giving them the standard safety spiel. Rey was pettily pleased that some of the stewardess’ perfect blonde hair was sticking to her face. It was _hot._

 

“Yeah, well I’m only going to this shit-show now because my mother is making me.”

 

“You’re a grown man,” she hissed to Ben as the plane taxied down the runway. “How can your mother be making you go to your own- _relative’s_ wedding?”

 

“She said she’d cut me out of her will,” he said, leaning back as the plane took off.

 

Rey felt her jaw drop. “Oh my god- you’re just doing this for the money.”

 

“Yes,” said Ben, looking over at her. “I’m doing this for the money. I’m thirty seven with no children, no committed romantic partner, and no relationships anywhere on the horizon. The likelihood of my needing a caretaker in the future is statistically inevitable, and I need to be able to afford it. So yes: tell me again why I shouldn’t do it for the money.”

 

Rey opened and shut her mouth a few times, because _holy fucking shit._ What was she supposed to say to that? “I can see why you’re single,” she finally said.

 

“What about you?” said Ben. “No rings, you have to be thirty five, and the fact that you’re traveling alone to your ex-fiance’s wedding tells me there’s no guy in the picture to stop you. You’re one to talk, lady.”

 

“I’m actually thirty two, and you’re an asshole!” said Rey with forced cheer.

 

To review: not only would she get to watch Poe marry a man in front of God and everyone- and she wasn’t upset that he was bisexual, it really wasn’t an _issue,_ she’d known that: it was just that… well, everyone was going to look at her, right? _Oh no, poor Rey, she must think she’s so defective because her fiance jilted her for a man._

 

So there was all of _that,_ and to top it all off she was going to be stuck at an “intimate southern celebration of love” with this fucking creep.

 

She pulled out her work papers and pretended to read. Somehow depositions were hard to focus on at the moment.

 

“What do you do for a living?” asked Ben. _Why couldn’t he just leave her to suffer in peace?_

 

“Why are we doing this?” asked Rey, dropping the papers into her lap and turning to glare at him. “What’s with the questions? It’s not like you care.”

 

“We’ll likely be in close proximity to each other for the rest of the weekend,” said Ben.

 

He really did have a nice voice- no, Rey. No. He did not.

 

“I thought that dissipating any lingering awkwardness between us could only be to our benefit. It seemed like the smart thing to do,” he finished.

 

“Fine,” said Rey. That was as close to _you’re right,_ as she was willing to admit. “I’m an environmental prosecutor.”

 

“The climate police, huh?” he said, scooting around in his tiny seat and trying to get comfortable.

 

“More like the water police,” said Rey. “What about you?”

 

“I work for First Order Marketing in D.C. I’ve been on the Wells Fargo account recently, so I must have done some pretty bad shit in a past life.”

 

“And in this life,” said Rey. “You’ve got a hell of a task with those bastards.”

 

“Yeah, tell me about it,” said Ben, ripping open the tiny packet of animal crackers that had been emblazoned with the airline logo.

 

Rey did the same, and made a face at the cardboard taste. She wished she’d been given more than two tablespoons of ginger ale: these little fuckers were dry.

 

“I just- as a country,” she said, swallowing hard. The little lion blob was really fighting not to go down. “As a country, I don’t understand how we’ve come to this. How is okay for criminal banks to stay open and in power?”

 

“Since lobbying became legal,” said Ben, making a face at his own animal crackers and shoving the still-full packet down into the pocket  on the seat in front of him.

 

 _Probably years worth of hidden animal crackers had a thriving society going on in there,_ Rey thought. “Fuck lobbyists,” she said, tentatively giving an elephant a go.

 

“Says the woman who is probably fine with people shaming electric companies or oil pipelines into non-existence or compliance,” said Ben.

 

“Touche,” said Rey. She relegated her crackers to seat-pouch oblivion as well. “But I’m not trying to fuck over the common person.”

 

“Not with that attitude,” said Ben.

 

Since Rey decided that growling at him probably wasn’t a solid way to un-awkward their conversation, she opted to spend the rest of the short flight in silence. So much for her non-disastrous day.

 

~~~

 

Ben was waiting for her at the rental car counter. Well- not waiting for _her,_ she hoped as she wheeled her suitcase along. Just _already there._

 

“Poe booked us into the same car,” he said. “Come on.”

 

 _I can live with that,_ Rey told herself as she followed Ben out into the wet Georgia heat. _It’s environmentally efficient to use one car for two people going to the same place. It’s fine. We un-awkwarded._

 

“Fucking Poe,” Ben said, stopping.

 

Rey goggled. She’d never know what it really meant until then, but now she knew: she was goggling. Their car was a diarrhea-yellow two-door Fiat. Ben was six foot three, and Poe had rented them… a Fiat.

 

“He always did have a sick sense of humor,” said Rey, reaching to take the keys from Ben’s loose fingers. “C’mon, I’ll drive.”

 

“I’m not letting you drive,” said Ben, clenching his fist.

 

“Will you even fit behind the wheel?” asked Rey. She could feel her dress sticking to her back; she wanted to get in the goddamn car and crank up the AC and get this whole weekend over with.

 

“Yes,” said Ben through gritted teeth, beeping open the door locks and wrenching open the back hatch. “Give me your bag.”

 

Rey pushed past him to lay her carry-on next to Ben’s. “Now give me the keys.”

 

“No,” said Ben. “It said on the paperwork that I was the driver.”

 

“And it didn’t have me as the second driver?” Rey asked. How dare Poe? The man she’d been engaged to would never have dared-

 

“Yes, you were,” said Ben, bending down to fiddle with the driver’s seat. “But I am not going to show up to this fucking estate riding shotgun in a shit-colored Fiat. I have some pride.”

 

“Oh, so just because you’re a man you think riding in the passenger seat is somehow lesser?” asked Rey, hands on hips. She could feel her face turning red, and she really wished she’d brought the full-sized thing of sunscreen. Goddamn TSA.

 

“No,” said Ben, shoving the seat back as hard as he could. Rey heard something pop. “Yes- just get in the godforsaken car,” he said, folding himself in and snapping the door shut behind him.

 

“Fine,” Rey muttered, and walked around to the other side. “But I’m driving on the way back to the airport on Sunday,” she said, sliding into the little car. It really did feel like they were just barely off the ground.

 

Ben muttered something, and it sounded like, “Maybe, if we live that long.”

 

Rey chose not to comment.

 

~~~

 

She could admit that this part of Georgia was gorgeous. It was all rolling hills and yellowish hay fields and the occasional stunning live oak or magnolia tree. There was one vineyard that seemed to go on for miles, and thoroughbred farms and little towns with red, white, and blue bunting hanging on their Main Street stores.

 

It was Ben that broke the silence. “We’ve been on Route 81 for forever,” he said. “Do me a favor and plug the address into your phone, okay? I want to know when the next turn is coming up.”

 

“Why _my_ phone,” asked Rey, reaching for his where it lay in the console between them. “Why can’t we use your data?”

 

“Fine,” said Ben, and it sounded like he was talking through gritted teeth again. Rey looked over- she had to admit, the tension was doing wonderful things for his jaw. “The pin code is 0607.”

 

“Anything special?” asked Rey, thumbing it in and pulling up his map app.

 

“What, are you trying to steal my identity?” asked Ben.

 

“God, you weren’t dumb enough to use a birthday, were you?” asked Rey. “It’s the first thing anyone tries! You should never use a birthday in a password-”

 

“It’s not like passwords are really that much help,” Ben interrupted. “People can skim your passwords first pass. It’s only double encryption that really keeps you safe- almost all Americans’ financial information is on the internet anyway, one way or another.”

 

“Yeah, but there’s no need to make it easier for people,” said Rey, shifting in her seat. “We’re going to turn onto Davis Road in about six miles.”

 

Ben nodded, and Rey watched the fields roll by for a while longer. She could tell they were getting to rich people country: more and more homes looked like small French villas, complete with pools and private tennis courts.

 

“You know, it’s weird, isn’t it,” she said, still watching idly out the window. “You know- turning a house that ran on slave labor into some kind of weird monument to beauty and love. It’s seems insensitive. Of course, burning the house to the ground also seems wrong, because it’s not like that could undo the crimes perpetrated there, and it would be the destruction of interesting historical architecture.”

 

“Capitalism has deemed it acceptable,” said Ben. “People vote with their hard, cold cash every time they book the place or take a tour, right? Money keeps institutions like this one alive, therefore the majority of the country is tacitly accepting that yes, they are willing to preserve this.”

 

“But what’s the appeal?” Rey asked, spinning a loose piece of hair near her face. “Do people want to pretend they’re landed gentry?” _Alright, so it might not have been the first time she’d thought that she could pull off the corset-and-skirts look, but she’d thought it about Regency England. Which wasn’t much better._

 

“Yes,” said Ben immediately.  
  
“Figures,” mumbled Rey. She’d have to work until she was a hundred and fifty to afford the kind of houses they were passing now.

 

Ben rolled his eyes. “Oh, don’t pretend you don’t have delusions of grandeur. We all want to boost our status. Corner offices, nice cars, expensive perfume, big apartments with marble counters-”

 

“Some of those things are practical!” said Rey. “It’s smart to want a car that won’t strand you on the side of the highway!”

 

“But it’s _more_ practical to drive an old car into the ground,” said Ben. “It’s even better for the environment.”

 

He had her there.

 

“It just feels fucked up,” said Rey, circling back around to their original topic.

 

Ben glanced over at her, one eyebrow raised. “Why? It’s not like it was your ancestors who were affected.”

 

“You don’t know that!” said Rey. “Besides, opting out is a form of privilege.”

 

“Yeah, I know,” said Ben. “But it’s fun getting you all riled up.”

 

Rey could feel her blood pressure rising. If he hit her with the, “You’re so cute when you’re mad,” speech, she might snatch the wheel and drive them both into the ditch. It’s not like she’d be missing much.

 

“So why are you coming to your ex-fiance’s wedding?” Ben asked. “That seems to be… very poor taste.”

 

“I was invited,” said Rey haughtily. “And besides, I promised him I would when we broke up,” she added a little sheepishly.

 

It was almost- but not quite- nice to talk to this guy. He didn’t bullshit around the truth (even though he was an ass about it) and she was never going to have to see him again after this weekend. It was kind of like a free confession, but without the annoyance of a priest or penance.

 

“You _promised?”_ Ben asked, disdain dripping off every syllable. “When… he dumped you?”

 

“Yeah,” said Rey on a sigh. “When he called off the wedding he was so apologetic- he went on about how we could be friends, and then made me promise that when I got married, I’d invite him. He promised that when he got married, I’d have to come to his.”

 

“And you did it?” asked Ben.

 

“Yes,” snapped Rey, tired of feeling like her intelligence was being questioned. “I did it, okay?”

 

“Why?” He was looking over at her now, both eyebrows nearly to his hairline.

 

“Watch the road!” Rey added, and Ben pulled the Fiat back onto their side of the street.

 

“I made a promise, okay? And I keep my promises.” _Understatement of the year,_ she thought.

 

“Jesus,” Ben muttered as they turned onto the long drive up to Corellia Hall. “Don’t tell me it’s about being honorable or some shit-”

 

“Yeah, I don’t think you need to worry about that,” said Rey as the plantation house turned event-venue came into view. “Because I don’t think you’d know what it means.”

 

~~~

 

It was beautiful. She had to admit the house was beautiful: it was all white brick and towering columns and wrap-around verandahs and porches with wrought-iron railings. Massive old trees shaded the house, and the lawn was golf-course green.

 

 _Probably using toxic fertilizers,_ she told herself as a valet took the dirty-diaper colored car away and she and Ben rolled their luggage inside. Inside the house was just as beautiful, with high ceilings and plaster work and _beautifully functioning air conditioning._

 

Once again, Ben got to the counter first, damn those long legs.

 

“Ben Solo,” he said, passing over his driver’s license.

 

~~~

 

A smiling blonde walked them up to their rooms, which actually locked with real, heavy brass keys. _Why the fuck??_ Rey thought as they climbed the grand, sweeping staircase. _This doesn’t exactly fit in a pocket. What’s wrong with a key card?_

 

Her room was right next to Ben’s. Of course it was. As she locked the door behind her she could hear Ben doing the same next door. Rey mentally reviewed the sex toys she’d packed for the weekend: the wand that plugged into the wall was _out,_ but the other two vibrators would be fine. And she was _pretty_ sure she’d packed a dildo, too.

 

Despite the thin walls, her room was lovely. There was a reading nook in one corner with a wingback chair and ottoman, all done up in a soft floral print. The bed was covered with pale duvet, and a subtle, silvery wallpaper gently reflected back the late afternoon light. It looked exactly like the kind of room where you’d put a single thirty-two year old who’d traveled to a wedding.

 

The sun was still high and bright at six in the evening, and according to the schedule that had been taped to her mirror, the rehearsal dinner was on the back patio at seven thirty. It was to be a semi-formal function. She had an hour and a half to kill, so Rey mastubated with the detached and practiced hand of a woman who had long (long) ago decided on two things:

 

One- that she was responsible for her own orgasms and

Two- efficiency wasn’t something to scoff at.

 

After she finished she showered, washing the toys off in the water with her. Again: efficiency. Why did everyone knock it?

 

That still left her with an hour to kill, so she put on the big fluffy bathrobe and started to explore. The door at the back opened onto a narrow balcony that ran along the whole side of the house. It was shady, but still oppressively hot and humid, so Rey didn’t do anything more than stick her head out.

 

The next door hid her television, microwave, mini-fridge, and room safe.

 

The third door was _not_ to her closet.

 

“Oh,” she said as she nearly fell into the room next door.

 

Ben was sitting in a little living room on a couch wearing only black briefs. His thighs looked wider than her waist, he had the tiniest bit of hair on his chest, and Jeopardy was playing on TV. It was a totally incongruous scene: the bizarre hotness level of his body and the old-man activity.

 

“I thought this was a closet,” said Rey. “I was going to hang up my dress.” _Yeah, right,_ she told herself. She’d never willingly unpacked a suitcase in her life.

 

“Okay,” said Ben.  He had one eyebrow raised in an unspoken dare, and he made absolutely no move to cover up any part of himself. Without Alex Trebek in the background, this could have been a Moment.

 

He had really deep brown eyes, and weren’t they pretty? _Stop it!_ she told herself. “I can see now that there’s a bolt on this door, which would be weird for a closet,” she said. “Unless it was the closet of a serial killer. I’ll just- I’ll go now.”

 

She pulled herself back into her room, threw the bolt, and leaned against the door with her eyes squinches shut so tightly it almost hurt. _Briefs, huh,_ was her first thought. Her second was _Shit. I’m going to have to see him at dinner._

 

~~~

 

Like everything else about Corellia Estates, the back patio was lovely. The verandah was wide and shaded and strung with red party lanterns, swaying cheerfully in the evening breeze. The patio began at the bottom of the wide planked steps, all fairy lights and complicated brickwork and iron tables covered in white clothes. With the massive old trees in the background it could have been a party held anytime in the past two centuries- and probably that was the appeal. This place was the definition of timeless.

 

Rey took her assigned seat promptly at seven thirty and looked at the other… _four_ guests who had deigned to show up on time.  There were about thirty chairs all together, not counting the table that was decked out all in white. The invitation hadn’t been lying about this being an ‘intimate’ celebration. Which was just- just great.

 

Ben came out the back doors of the old house and started weaving through tables, reading name cards. She’d let him discover everything on his own.

 

“You’ve got to be kidding,” he said when he saw that the fancy calligraphy card with his name was right next to her.

 

“Nope,” she said. “It’s us and a couple people named Beatrice and Amelia.”

 

“That’s just- that’s perfect,” said Ben, dropping down into his seat. “And I see nobody else thinks that schedules should be honored.”

 

“No,” said Rey glumly.

 

“I’m going to the bar- you want anything?” he asked, standing again.

 

“Anything,” said Rey.

 

He came back with a tumbler of amber liquid for himself and a mojito for Rey. “I’d be mad,” she said, taking a swig. “But you were goddamn right.”

 

“I figured I was,” said Ben, knocking back half his drink. “Poe would never had proposed to a girl who didn’t drink rum.”

 

“Why are you here?” asked Rey, toying with the little mint leaves stuck to the side of her glass.

 

Ben turned at looked at her. “Have you suffered a concussion in the last two hours?”

 

“No, I mean- why are you here, at this table way in the back with me? You’re family.”

 

People were starting to trickle out of house, now. Rey saw Leia come out in a shiney, pearl grey dress, and her hair was (as always) impeccably braided up to the top of her head. A tall, slim woman with smile lines and bright purple hair followed after.

 

“Oh, it’s complicated,” said Ben with dark glee as he, too, watched people find their seats. “You know mom, right? Of course you do, she still talks about you. By the way, her version of you is much more appealing. Anyway,  she left my father and now is living with her new life partner, Amy Holdo there with the purple hair.”

 

“She didn’t,” Rey gasped, enjoying the gossip despite herself.

 

“So she and dad can’t be seated together. Dad is living with his old roommate Chewie, and dad’s dating the girl he was with during college before mom. Her name is Qi’ra. It’s a classic midlife “return to the good times” crisis.

 

“I’m currently not speaking to my father, which just complicates things,” said Ben, gulping down the rest of his drink. So far they were still the only two sitting; everyone else was laughing and talking over by the trees.

 

“Why?” asked Rey. At least this was interesting- and maybe she’d been lucky not to marry into the family.

 

“Because Dad’s pal Chewie shot me,” said Ben.

 

“He shot you?” Rey ripped her gaze off the other party-goers and turned to stare at Ben.

 

He nodded. “Shot me. Said he thought I was a deer. Since dad refused to throw Chewie out of the house, we aren’t speaking.”

 

“Did it hurt?” asked Rey, catching herself leaning a little closer to Ben.

 

He looked down at her with an expression of incredulity. “Did it hurt? Of course it fucking hurt, a projectile entered my body at more than a thousand miles an hour.”

 

“Well, yeah,” said Rey. Like an idiot.

 

“You’re just after pain porn,” said Ben, rolling his eyes. “I wasn’t done with the story- I wouldn’t care if I  sat with mom- it would be weird as hell, but I wouldn’t care. Unfortunately, it’s not my call. If _Poe_ stuck me with mom, it would look like he was taking her side in things. So instead, I’m here. With you, and whoever the hell Beatrice is. It’s a chess game, and you and I are- are less than pawns.”

 

“How’d we end up at the table for misfit toys?” asked Rey, draining her mojito down to the ice. “Is that all we are? The people that nobody knows that to do with?”

 

“Yes,” said Ben. “We’re awkward, we work, and we die.”

 

“Then what the hell is the point?”

 

That question hung in the air like toxic smog. Dance music was playing quietly in the background (despite the fact that nobody was dancing), and the quiet hum of conversation washed around Ben and Rey like the tide.

 

On a burst of noise- laughter and jeers and shouted, excited hellos- Finn and Poe charged out of the back doors. Finn had gone traditional with navy pants, a seersucker button up, and a bow tie. Poe was in baby blue suit. They both looked radiantly, joyfully, contagiously happy.

 

“Are you going to go say hello?” asked Ben after a moment.

 

“Yeah,” said Rey, smoothing the skirt of her navy blue sundress. “Guess I have to at some point. What about you?”

 

“Right behind you.”

 

 _I hope this isn’t as bad as I think it’s going to be,_ she thought.

 

It wasn’t as bad as she expected. It was worse.

 

~~~

 

“Pain porn, huh, said Rey as she downed half of her second mojito. The waiter had just brought out their salad course, and it was… fine. She still wasn’t convinced about the pine nuts, but it was, you know. Fine.

 

“Yeah,” said Ben, politely turning his fork tine-down on the salad plate. Almost immediately a waiter swooped it up. “Everyone just wants to hear about other people’s suffering. It’s so they can go, “Oh, that’s so terrible, thank god it wasn’t me.”

 

Rey knew about that. “You’re right,” she said.

 

His head turned to her so fast she thought he’d break something.

 

“What did you say?”

 

“The pain porn thing. You’re right. People want all the gory details, and it’s so they can feel righteous about pitying you.”

 

“Yeah, well, you’d know about pity,” said Ben, watching as a different  waiter carried a tray of shrimp and chicken towards the bridal party. “Considering you’re a thin, successful, if somewhat neurotic white lady.”

 

“I would,” said Rey. “I was dropped off at a fire station when I was four.”

 

A bubble of silence seemed to start at her lips and expand until it included Ben, too.

 

“Not to mention I was jilted by my fiance,” Rey asked, her voice light. She took another dainty bite of salad.

“I shouldn't have said that,” said Ben, eventually. “I’m sorry. But you’re still a fit, white, successful lady, so my sympathy is limited, alright? You have, like, privileged people suffer points.  So… was this the first time you’ve seen him since you promised to attend this, as-yet-unplanned wedding?

 

“Yup,” said Rey, shoving another bite of salad into her mouth. She wasn’t going to waste free food.

 

“Was it as bad as you thought it would be?”

 

“Oh, worse. Much worse,” said Rey, finishing her drink. “Everyone was just as nice. I was hoping they’d be all- I don’t know, distant and rude and haughty, and I would be able to leave telling myself that I was better off. But nope. They’re lovely.”

 

The waiter took her clean plate, and Rey glanced across the patio. Poe was laughing with Finn and their grooms-people. Leia and Amy were holding hands under the table, and Han was laughing loudly with his group. It looked so- normal. And once again, she was on the outside looking in.

 

“Do you think anyone would notice if I just- went back inside?” she asked.

 

“Not a one,” said Ben. “Our presence here- both at this party, and on this earth- has absolutely no point.”

 

“Great,” muttered Rey, sliding out of her chair. “Very uplifting.”

 

“Sweet dreams,” Ben called from behind her.


	2. Saturday

The sound of mock-warfare filtered through the thick undergrowth of the estate’s old-growth forest. Occasionally the  _ popop!  _ of a paintball gun would interrupt the tranquility of Rey’s hiding spot, but for the most part, she was safe. So far the half-hour she’d spent hiding behind the abandoned old shed had been the highlight of her weekend.

 

“They picked house three.”

 

“What?” Rey turned and looked at Ben, who was walking, bent nearly double, through the shrubbery towards her. 

 

“Last night, on House Hunters. I could hear that you were watching it too. The assholes went with house three.”

 

“Fuckers,” said Rey, clicking her phone screen to black. She’d rather die than admit to Ben that she’d been reading an analysis of current dating websites, debating which one she should but ultimately wouldn’t try. 

 

“They couldn’t see past the paint color,” said Ben, sliding down the wall of the shed to sit beside her. 

 

“How did you find me?” asked Rey. She could hear distant shrieks, and the occasional  _ pop!  _ of a pressurized air canister. 

 

“I saw you slink back here and you never came out, so I figured you’d either died or found somewhere to hide. Either option sounded better than more paintball, so here I am.”

 

“Get your own hiding place,” said Rey. 

 

“This is more efficient,” said Ben. 

 

Rey slid her phone into her bra and zipped her horrible paint-proof jumpsuit up again. “Who’s idea was this?” she asked. “Paintball before a wedding? I mean, jesus. Someone could get hurt. One of the grooms could end up going down the aisle with a black eye.”

 

“It’s a way of entertaining guests while also lending an air of masculinity to an otherwise effete event. Besides, violence and sex? Classic pairing. Probably Finn and Poe are getting all worked up for tonight.”

 

“No,” said Rey. “That’s not true. I don’t know about you, bust most people prefer their sex violence-free.”

 

“That’s just not true,” said Ben, turning to look at her. “Sex in itself is a violent, penetrative, thrusting act. It’s a simulacrum of violence.”

 

“You’re erasing all the people who don’t have penetrative sex,” said Rey. “That’s bad marketing.”

 

“Fine, but you’re erasing all of the people who enjoy mutually agreed-upon bondage, spanking, and other forms of unconventional play, which includes pain.”

 

“You say that like you  _ know,”  _ said Rey, trying not to imagine Ben in that room from Fifty Shades of Grey. The movie was a trashfire, but the ...visuals? A fucking plus.

 

“You say that like you’re normal,” Ben replied in the same tone. 

 

“I think it’s- it’s just mock war,” said Rey, trying to move the conversation back to nice, safe violence. “It’s pointless. There’s a whole song about it.”

 

“I disagree. I think humans need to feel that they’re conquering something in order to truly feel whole,” said Ben. “It’s why we have such high participation in sports. It’s civilized warfare.”

 

“We could have gone for a trail ride,” said Rey wistfully. “I saw it listed on the website for this place. 

 

“And you think paintball is dangerous? Horseback riding is incredibly foolhardy. They’re two thousand pound prey animals that we can only halfway tame at the best of times. Do you want to end up like Christopher Reeves?”

 

“No,” said Rey. “But I wouldn’t mind seeing your mom on a horse.”

 

“They’d probably have to give her a pony,” Ben agreed. “So you don’t like pain with your sex?”

 

“What?” asked Rey, gaping at him. “What is your problem?”

 

“I don’t have a problem, it seems to be you who has the problem,” said Ben in his patient voice. 

 

_ Great. She’d spent enough time around Ben to recognize his patient voice.  _

 

“Pain and pleasure are very closely linked in the brain,” Ben continued. “By adding one, you can heighten the sensation of the other.”

 

“You- you- this is none of your business,” said Rey. 

 

Ben sighed. “I always suspected Poe was hopelessly vanilla.”

 

Rey rolled her eyes so hard she made herself dizzy. 

 

“Okay, except for the sex with men thing,” said Ben. “But there has to be vanilla sex for gay people, too.”

 

Rey decided to opt out of this whole conversation. She pulled her mask bad down over her face, grabbed the gun (probably correctly?) and ran out from behind the shed. She heard Ben yell, “Coward!” after her, and then she was shot, six times, in the belly and the back. 

 

Spectacular.

 

~~~

 

“What are you doing here?” Ben asked, picking his face out of the padded headrest on the massage table. 

 

“I- I booked a massage, they said they had the space-”

 

“Did you specify that you wanted a singles massage?” asked Ben, putting his head back down. 

 

“Did you?” asked Rey, clutching her robe closed. 

 

“Yes,” said Ben. “Of course I did.”

 

“I’m going to ask for a different room,” said Rey, walking out. 

 

“Good!” Ben yelled from behind her.

 

“Well, this is the only space left,” said Rey, storming back into the room. “And since I was driven out of my hiding space by your questioning, I’m going to stay and get my massage.”

 

“Fine,” said Ben. “It’s typically a silent activity, anyway. 

 

Rey kept her eyes focused on him while she quickly slipped out of her robe and got beneath the sheet of the massage table. 

 

“You don’t- you don’t think Poe is trying to set us up, do you?” Rey asked as she settled down. 

 

“No,” said Ben. “Poe has never in his life been smart enough to mastermind something like this.”

 

“If it is him, I’m surprised he’s being this subtle,” Rey commented. “Locking someone in a wine cellar with a box of condoms is more his style.”

 

“True,” said Ben. “I can’t imagine what you ever saw in him.”

 

“He was nice,” said Rey, remembering. “We met when I was out with friends, and we hit it off.”

 

“But not off enough,” said Ben. “Otherwise we wouldn’t be here.”

 

“Yes,thanks for reminding me, I’d somehow forgotten. What about you?” she asked, determined to get off the defensive. “Have you ever been engaged?”

 

“No,” said Ben. “I’ve never been in love, engaged, or otherwise brought low.”

 

“So what,” asked Rey. “You just want to be alone forever?”

 

“Yes. While the rest of the population stresses about finding a mate or keeping said mate, I can reap the benefits of-”

 

“What, blue balls?”

 

“No,” said Ben. “Of a level head. I know what I can expect from my life, there are very few surprises.”

 

“Isn’t that some kind of atrophy?” asked Rey. The masseuses walked in, and started their work, and Rey sighed. That was- yeah. That was the shit. 

 

“Destination weddings are just the- I don’t know, it’s the height of narcissism,” she said, only a little breathily. “Please take time off work, give up a whole weekend, and spend a couple thousand dollars of your own money just to prove you love us enough.”

 

“It’s insane,” Ben agreed. “You invite a bunch of strangers to a distant location and then spend no time with them, forcing them to interact with each other as a sign of devotion. It’s like they’re playing god and forcing the faithful to make a pilgrimage.”

 

“But why?” asked Rey. “It’s not like there aren’t any churches or county clubs at home?”

 

“Because it’s exotic.”

 

“Really? Rural Georgia is exotic?”

 

“Anywhere that isn’t home is exotic,” said Ben, and then he- yeah, he moaned just a little. Rey tried really hard to keep that noise from being stored in her memory, but she had a feeling it was going to crop up at inopportune moments. Like the next time she broke out her vibrator. 

 

“It’s a dick move,” said Rey. “What do you think would happen if someone had a destination wedding, and then all of their friends and family refused to go? Would they call it off”

 

“That wouldn’t ever happen,” said Ben. 

 

“I know,” said Rey. “But what it?”

 

“There’s no point in playing ‘what if’, because it would never happen. Modern culture has turned affection into a- a performance art. Now that we don’t have to kill off our enemies or drop food at our beloved’s feet we’ve had to come up with new ways to show our devotion.”

 

“That’s ridiculous,” said Rey. 

 

“We’re just animals,” said Ben. “We just make it more complicated.”

 

“Yeah, says Mister ‘I don’t need a mate’.”

 

“Touche, Rey. Touche.”

 

~~~

 

“What the hell?” asked Rey, looking down at the winding dirt path down to the river-side wedding location. The flowering archway was on the dock that led to a large gazebo surrounded by water. The chairs for the audience had been set up in two sections facing the river, and in order to get down to the chairs it looked like they had to walk the length of a football field down a soft, steep, totally dirt path. “It’s a fucking goat track.”

 

“And?” asked Ben. It was absolutely unfair that he managed to look so non-sweaty even wearing a dark suit in Georgia in June. As far as Rey was concerned, they might as well be on the surface of mercury. 

 

“The heels won’t make it,” she said. 

 

“The schedule mentioned that-” 

 

“I read the schedule once before I typed it in my phone calendar, okay?”

 

Ben heaved a sigh.    
  


“I can’t believe you’re making me ask,” said Rey. 

 

“Ask what?”

 

“Just carry me down there, please? Once again, we’re the only people on schedule.”

 

“How much do you weigh?” he asked, squinting down at her. 

 

“What kind of question is that?” She was tempted to strange him with the strap of her crossbody purse. Maybe he had been right about neither of them surviving the weekend. 

 

“I want to know if I’m putting myself at risk,” said Ben, sizing her up. 

 

Rey knew she looked as good as a thirty-two year old with no social life could look. She was in a silk jumpsuit with nude heels, and she’d managed to get her hair off her neck in way that was still flattering. She was winning “ex’s summer wedding”. At least until she’d seen the trail down. 

 

“Fine,” said Ben. 

 

He almost dropped her. It was the closest she’d ever come, and when he finally did manage to stand all the way up, he wheezed. 

 

“Do you have asthma?” she asked. If he did, she could probably walk. Probably. 

 

“No,” he said, taking a hesitant step. “You have a high specific gravity.”

 

“I get lots of calcium,” said Rey. She could feel his stomach muscles moving as he leaned back against the pull of the hill and his altered center of gravity. It was- well, it was pretty nice. (Another thing for her to add to her ‘use with vibrators’ bank.) “Dense bones.”

 

“Uh huh,” said Ben. His arms weren’t shaking, and he was looking steadfastly straight ahead, like a man with a last cigarette eyeing the firing squad. 

 

“This is- this is the slowest I’ve ever been carried,” said Rey, watching the gathering of chairs grow  _ very slowly  _ closer. 

 

“Please stop talking,” Ben bit out. 

 

Honestly,  Rey could have walked down to the seating arrangement barefoot. The path wasn’t that rocky, and they were early enough that she could have put her shoes back on and nobody would be the wiser. But this- this was kind of fun.    
  


It had taken her a moment to realize that, because she had such little spontaneity in her life. 

 

~~~

 

“It’s a thousand degrees,” said Rey, fanning herself with the little paper fan bearing both Poe and Finn’s smiling faces. 

 

“Only ninety one,” said Ben evenly. 

 

“And humid!” Rey continued. “The heat index has to be 108. The National Weather Service has probably put out a warning for infants and people with lung problems!”

 

“Are you an infant or someone with a lung problem?” asked Ben.

 

“No,” said Rey, wishing she’d brought a hat like Leia’s Amy. “But it’s the principle of the thing. They didn’t even pick a location with shade!”

 

“They’ll get better pictures here,” said Ben. “It’s golden hour.”

 

“I’m getting sunburned for pictures, oh my god,” whimpered Rey. 

 

Ben rolled his eyes, and then his hand wrapped around the base of her neck. 

 

“What are you doing?”

 

“Keeping your neck from getting sunburnt.”

 

“Thank you.” It just- it was totally disconcerting how big his hand was. His fingertips were beneath her right ear, and the heel of his hand rested comfortably by the other. It was too easy to imagine how one of those big hands could totally cover her breast, or-

 

“You’re sweaty.”

 

“Everyone is sweaty!” Dammit, he’d ruined a perfectly good fantasy.

 

Poe and Finn walked down the aisle to the dock hand in hand, big grins on their faces. “See,” hissed Rey. “Even they’re sweaty.”

 

“Who’s that officiating?” asked Ben, squinting. 

 

“Rose,” said Rey. “I got the gossip this morning. She’s Finn’s live in roommate.”

 

“Okay,” said Ben. 

 

“No, you don’t get it. She’s his  _ live in roommate,  _ and she has sleepovers with him and Poe.”

 

“By sleepovers you mean-?”

 

“Yes,” said Rey, grinning. “Exactly that.”

 

“And she’s marrying them?”

 

“Yes, but only literally.” 

 

“Is that legal?”

 

“According to the state of Georgia; she’s got the internet certificate to prove it.”

 

“Why would she do that? I talked to her yesterday, she seems smart. She’s an engineer.”

 

“Engineers can be kinky too,” said Rey, nodding. 

 

“Yeah, but- do you think she’ll, you know. Still be Finn’s roommate?” 

 

“Probably. Hard thing to break, leases.”

 

“But whose bed will she sleep in?”

 

“That’s the real question,” said Rey. “I kind of think it’s sweet. They’re all getting what they want, right?”

 

“You think pain in sex is deviant, but a bisexual throuple is sweet?”

 

“Yes,” said Rey. “It is.”

 

“There’s no such thing as sweet,” said Ben, shifting in his seat. “It’s just endorphins that trick you into stupid behavior until they too pass.”

 

“And then what?” asked Rey. “If it’s all endorphins, how do old people stay married?”

 

“They’re too afraid to die alone.”

 

“Really nice, Ben. Very romantic. But you aren’t? Afraid to die alone, that is?”

 

“We all die alone. Except maybe the Ancient Pharaohs, who were buried with their pets and servants, but it still: we all find out what happens after death completely alone.”

 

“What do you think? Happens I mean,” asked Rey, watching as Rose took a seat in the front row.

 

“I think it’s just nothing,” said Ben. 

 

A figure in a bright, tie-dyed robe was getting up in front of the happy couple now. “Who’s that?”

 

“Uncle Luke,” said Ben, and Rey could hear his grin. “He joined a hippie monastery.”

 

“He did not!” gasped Rey. 

 

“He did. He lives in mostly silence milking cows and thanking mother nature for her bounty, or some shit.”

 

“I think I saw his robe on sale at Whole Foods,” said Rey, leaning around to get a better look.

 

“Probably. On anyone else it would be a poncho,” said Ben. 

 

“So that’s pointless too?” asked Rey as the happy couple exited the venue, followed by their wedding party and Rose and Luke and the crying family. “Religion?”

 

“Absolutely,” said Ben. “It’s all just lies designed to make us feel better.”

 

~~~

 

The reception was held in a couple large, wall-less tents strung with fairy lights and gardenia blooms. People were dancing to old big band tunes, and Poe and Finn were taking turns feeding each other bites of fancy cheese. It was nauseating. 

 

“I used to like this song,” Rey commented. Poe had picked it for the first ‘group dance’ song for  _ their  _ wedding. 

 

“Do you want to dance?” asked Ben in the tone someone might use to ask, “ _ Would you like to tour Chernobyl _ ?”

 

“No,” said Rey. “Unless you want-”

 

“No, I hate dancing.”

 

“Then why’d you ask?” she asked, exasperated. 

 

“It seemed like the right thing to do,” said Ben, crossing his arms. Rey took another sip of water and watched as Leia and Amy took the dance floor. They looked good together. They looked  _ happy.  _ Maybe she should do that- she’d tasted her own vagina juices once, out of curiosity, and it wasn’t that bad. Probably she’d make a good lesbian- she already had to shoe wardrobe for it. 

 

“Can we take a walk?” she asked Ben, who’d pretty much become her de facto companion for the weekend. At this point she wasn’t going to question it anymore. 

 

“Fine,” said Ben. “Are you sure your footwear is appropropriate?”

 

“Yes,” said Rey haughtily, stealing a big bottle of water from one of the caterer’s coolers. “I had the van take me back to the house to change.” 

 

“I know,” said Ben. “You terrified the poor driver.”

 

They wandered out into the fading evening, wandering back towards the house by tacit agreement. It was pretty, Rey could admit that. They hayfields looked golden in the honey-colored sun, the sky was smeared with pinks and tangerines and indigoes. The Sunset reflected off the tin roof of the barn and refracted in rainbow bursts from the pond. It was gorgeous. 

 

It was still as presumptuous as hell for Finn and Poe to have asked them to come all the way out here. 

 

“Do you think there’s someone for everybody out there?” Rey asked, already knowing what he’d say. 

 

“No,” said Ben immediately. “Maybe there are multiple persons out there that could be an ideal match, but I’ve already told you: we’re just animals. If we didn’t mate until we found some sort of ideal, the species would immediately start to decline, and based on how tribal humans could be, we’d likely be inbreeding within just a few generations.”

 

“Ew,” said Rey. “I mean, that’s cynical, even for you.

 

“Cynical might as well just mean ‘unpopular truth’ at this point,” said Ben, walking along beside her. She knew he was slowing his pace to match hers, but these ballerina flats weren’t exactly made for hiking along a gravel road, okay? 

 

“Well, that sounds like an excuse for being an asshole,” said Rey. “It’s like the whole, ‘Well, everyone has a right to their opinion,’ thing. They really  _ shouldn’t.  _ It’s this- I don’t know, it’s become this catch-all excuse for spreading factually incorrect information  _ and legitimizing it.” _

 

She was warming to the topic, and Ben still hadn’t interrupted her (which was something of a miracle) so Rey plowed on. “Take the anti-vaxxers. They’re running around telling people that vaccines cause autism and obesity and death and all kinds of bullshit, and when people try to refute them, they whip out the old, ‘Well I’m entitled to my opinion’ line. But it isn’t an opinion! It’s a flat out lie that’s endangering thousands of children and immunocompromised people! It’s child endangerment! It’s a crime!”

 

“So you don’t think people should be able to spread the word of the flat-earthers?” asked Ben. “Their Facebook page should be taken down?”

 

“Yes,” said Rey. 

 

“People could argue that that’s some kind of scientific fascism,” said Ben, raising an eyebrow.

 

Rey stopped walking and looked up at Ben, exasperated. “Do you really think that?” she asked. “Or are you just the jerk who plays devil’s advocate?”

 

Ben shrugged and almost managed to look sheepish. “It’s kind of fun to argue with you,” he admitted. 

 

“Oh my god,” said Rey, squinting into the glare of the mostly-set sun. “You mean this whole time we could have actually been agreeing on things?”

 

“Some things,” said Ben, walking again. They were skirting around the edge of the big pond now, coming out of a clump of meticulously tended trees. 

 

Something hissed. Something hissed  _ loudly.  _

 

“What was that?” Rey asked in a whisper that could nearly have been classified as a screech. 

 

“I don’t know,” said Ben, turning slowly and scanning the area. 

 

“It sounded like some kind of cougar,” said Rey. “Or maybe a bobcat.”

 

“Have you ever seen a cougar or a bobcat?” asked Ben, inching forward. “Get behind me.”

 

“If it’s a cougar you should get behind me,” said Rey. “It’ll go for the weakest member of the herd.”

 

“Who says it’s in front of us?” asked Ben. 

 

Together they crept around the next gradual curve in the road, and there it was again: a guttural hissing that did  _ not  _ sound like anything a cat (of whatever size) would make.

 

“It’s definitely in front of us,” said Ben. 

 

“But what is it?” asked Rey. They shuffled along the curve in the road, and then they saw it:

 

It was an alligator. It was an alligator on the side of the road, jaws open, eyes beady. 

 

“Fuck!” said Ben. 

 

“Jesus!” said Rey. “What do we do? Do we go back, or?”

 

“It’s a fucking alligator, why do you think I’d know what to do?” asked Ben, not taking his eyes off the prehistoric road block. 

 

“It could be a crocodile,” said Rey. 

 

“Crocodiles live in saltwater,” said Ben, edging away from the animal. 

 

“Well, a lot of the compounds used in fertilizer are salts,” said Rey. “Probably there are enough total dissolved solids in that pond for it to count as salt water!”

 

“Would you like to find out?” asked Ben, finding Rey’s wrist and gripping it tight. “That could be arranged.”

 

“No!” said Rey. “Maybe we could just go around…?

 

She took a step towards the alligator and it snapped at her.

 

“Alright!” she said, jumping back. “You should run.”

 

“Why can’t we both run?” asked Ben, his hand still tight around her wrist. 

 

“Because I’ve heard these things can lunge at thirty-five miles an hour. If you get away maybe you can bring back help before it dismembers me,” said Rey. 

 

“Last chance,” Ben muttered. 

 

“Before what?” asked Rey. 

 

Ben turned, wrenched her water bottle out of her hand, and hurled it, overhand, into the pond. It landed with a splash that seemed too loud in the deep twilight. When the bottle landed, the alligator turned, and slid into the water at an alarmingly fast speed. 

 

“Now we run,” said Ben, yanking Rey forward. 

 

“I can run by myself!” said Rey, trying to shake him off. He wasn’t having it. “But that was really smart!”

 

“I made it think its territory was being invaded,” huffed Ben. They were sprinting down a hill that wound around towards the horse barns, and Rey fully blamed Ben for what happened next: he missed the existence of a ditch, and because he was still fucking hanging onto her, he had them falling,  _ on top of each other,  _ down into a hayfield. 

 

When they finally stopped rolling she could hear him huffing off in the tall, dry grasses somewhere nearby. “I wonder what eldritch horrors live in here,” he muttered. “Rey- Rey!” 

 

She sucked in air as he flipped her over, finally managing to take in the breath she’d thought would never come. 

 

“M’fine,” she gasped, little oxygen-deprivation tears pricking at the corner of her eyes. “You knocked the wind out of me-” she coughed- “When you rolled over on me.”

 

“It was  _ your  _ fault,” said Ben, picking a piece of hay out of her hair. “You’re the one who wanted to take a fucking walk.”

 

“Well, if we’re playing by those rules, this whole weekend is my fault just for fucking showing up,” said Rey. 

 

“You said it, not me,” muttered Ben. 

 

“Why’d you save me?” asked Rey, looking over at Ben. It was a clear night and the stars were starting to prick to life overhead. He was a darker shadow against the navy of the night sky. 

 

“I was saving both of us,” said Ben. “I didn’t want to rot at the bottom of a polluted pond.”

 

“I offered to be the sacrifice,” said Rey. 

 

“Yeah, well, it didn’t feel right,” Ben muttered. 

 

“No, no, this is big,” said Rey, pushing herself up onto her knees and leaning towards Ben. “If you really thought that life was totally pointless and there wasn’t any hope for either of us, you’d have left me to be eaten by the alligator. But you  _ didn’t. _ ”

 

“Blame it on the whole animal thing again,” Ben muttered. “Self-preservation is the oldest instinct there is.”

 

“But that’s  _ self- _ preservation,” said Rey. She wasn’t sure why she was pressing this issue so hard, but he was fascinating her with his reticence to answer. “You didn’t just flee and leave me.”

 

“Tribal instincts?” Ben suggested.

 

Rey slumped back, falling into the sweet-smelling grass again. “Let’s face it, Ben,” she said, idly admiring the stars. “We  _ wish  _ we were hopeless. We talk a big game about how we’re fine on our own, and we’re so smart for opting out of the dating game, and people are just animals, blah blah blah. At the end of the day we’re just trying to save ourselves from the knowledge that there isn’t another person out of the seven billion on the planet that wants to spend time with us. Because that fucking hurts.”

 

She’d never admitted it out loud to herself before. She’d thought it, on dark nights when she couldn’t sleep and the empty side of her bed loomed, but she’d never  _ said  _ it. Rey didn’t even have time to be embarrassed because all of a sudden Ben’s shoulders were looming over her, blocking out the stars, and then he was kissing her. 

 

It turned out Ben’s lips were the softest thing on him. 

 

“What the hell, Ben?” Rey yelled when he pulled away. 

 

“It just- I don’t know, it felt like the thing to do.”

 

“Well- well-” Rey pulled him back down and kissed him again, her hands sliding over his chest and shoulders and under the suit.

 

“Hey! What the fuck?” shouted Ben, pushing away from her again. 

 

“I don’t know,” said Rey, reaching up to pull at her half-up, half down hair that was now bristling with loose bobby pins. “It was just-”

 

She didn’t get to finish the sentence because Ben stuck his tongue in her mouth.

 

“What the hell?” Rey asked flatly when Ben pulled away again. 

 

“I- I don’t know,” said Ben. “I think I have a problem enjoying things because I just know they’re going to end.”

 

“Yeah,” said Rey, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “Okay.”

 

“Well, what’s your excuse?” asked Ben. 

 

Rey thought about it for a second. “I don’t think sex is like a bicycle,” she said. “It doesn’t all come back.”

 

“Yeah,” said Ben, rolling his shoulders. “I don’t think I’ve experienced real pleasure since the economic crash.”

 

“You enjoyed that?” asked Rey, horrified. 

 

“No,” said Ben. “It was just a coincidence that my sexual economy tanked along with the global recession.”

 

“Jesus,” Rey mumbled, leaning in to kiss him again. He had a nice mouth- soft and not too- well, wet. He didn’t drool on her when they kissed, which was really a deal breaker for her. 

 

“I don’t have protection,” said Ben when they pulled apart again. Her hair was all the way down, now, and tangled into a hedgehog knot against the back of her neck. 

 

“Well why would you?” asked Rey, gesturing to the field around her. “Look at this! Who’d have thought we’d get lucky here, of all the godforsaken places.”

 

“It’s a bad idea,” he said. “What if you get pregnant?”

 

“I guarantee my womb is a hostile environment,” said Rey. 

 

“Do you have any diseases?”

 

“No,” said Rey. “I’ve missed every opportunity to rebel, experiment, or take part in a revolution, sexual or otherwise.” 

 

“Okay,” said Ben slowly. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

 

“Yeah?” asked Rey, starting to grin. “Okay. Okay, cool.”

 

While she unzipped her jumpsuit (thankful that this one went down the front, the zipper a gold-tone statement) Ben shrugged off his suit jacket and laid it down behind her on the hay. What a gentleman. 

 

He shoved his pants down just far enough to get his cock out. Meanwhile, Rey was left in nothing but a strapless bra. Now she was glad they were in Georgia: even dark, it was still fucking hot. 

 

She scooted back and laid down on Ben’s suit jacket while Ben awkwardly kind of seal-humped over to her with his pants around his thighs and his cock out. From what she could see, it was an excellent dick. 

 

He leaned down to kiss her again, and he ran a big palm up the inside of her thigh. “This is nice,” he said, leaning down to press wet, open-mouthed kisses to her collarbone. “I think it’s coming back to me.”

 

His fingers were carding through her folds, not really pleasuring yet, just learning her anatomy. 

 

“It is nice,” agreed Rey, toying with the soft hair at the back of Ben’s neck.

 

“How does that feel?” he asked, his blunt fingers starting to circle around her clit. 

 

“It’s… good,” Rey repeated. “Like going back to yoga after a long break, or having a second glass of wine when your tolerance is down.”

 

His fingers kept circling and circling, patiently waiting for optimal wetness (she wasn’t sixteen anymore, not that she’d ever want to go back, jesus), and they didn’t exactly keep lube bottles out in hay fields, if that’s what this stuff actually was. 

 

“I haven’t spent this much time just fingering a girl since I was in high school,” he said. “Actually, that was the first time I made a girl come. I was in the basement-”

 

“Yeah, of course you were,” Rey muttered, her hand sneaking between them to grab Ben’s wrist. He needed to be higher.

 

He took the correction without comment, and Rey licked her palm and moved to toy slowly with his cock. 

 

“We were watching some movie, and she’d been wearing this- I don’t know, it was like overalls on top, but it had a skirt. Made of denim.”

 

“Oh god, I had one of those,” said Rey, trying not to remember. “Least sexy outfit ever.”

 

“Well, I liked it because it let me get to second base,”  said Ben. He had his middle finger in her now, and that was nice too. 

 

“I’d heard you were supposed to finger a girl ‘until she was ready’, but I was six-fucking-teen, I didn’t know what ready meant. I just kept going, and going, and ignoring that my wrist hurt, and then suddenly she was shaking and clenching around my fingers. I think it surprised both of us.”

 

Rey was starting to feel hot and impatient, her hips chasing his hand, and Ben noticed, thank god.  He wiped his hand in the grass and opened her legs a little wider with his knees, notching himself into the cradle of her hips. 

 

“Still good?” he asked, setting himself against her entrance. 

 

“Yep,” said Rey, bracing both hands on his shoulders.  

 

He slid in, and it- okay, it was admittedly tight. She didn’t go for ‘ambitious’ with her dildoes. Rey was more about accessibility. If it took half a bottle of lube and forty minutes to make the dildo fun, she wasn’t into it. She didn’t have that kind of time any more. She had succulents to tend and a career-track to plod. 

 

“Christ,” said Ben, setting his forehead against hers. “You weren’t kidding about that dry spell, huh.”

 

“Nope,” said Rey, shimmying her hips against his. “But this is good. I like it.”

 

He started rocking against her, his shoulders bobbing as he did. “How’s this?”

 

“Good,” said Rey. “But could you just-” she hitched up a leg over his hip and dug her heel into his ass cheek. He jerked away from it, and hit just the right spot. 

 

“Oh god,” she said. “Right there.”

 

“Cheap shot, Johnson,” said Ben, but he kept up the rhythm, smooth and strong, that lovely cock of his hitting all the right spots. 

 

“Do you always talk this much during sex?” Rey asked, closing her eyes and sliding her hand down to toy with her clit. He was really ruining her concentration with the memory of those denim jumper dresses. 

 

“I don’t know,” said Ben. “It’s been too long.”

 

“Well, how about we don’t,” said Rey. 

 

Ben managed to be quiet for about a minute, and Rey had just hit a good rhythm with her fingers and his hips when he opened his damn fool mouth again. 

 

“On the off chance that we’re making a baby, I’d prefer if it was a girl,” he said. 

 

“Christ, Ben, what kind of comment is that?” Rey asked, bucking up against her own fingers. At least the man had stamina. 

 

“A logical one,” he said. He was starting to pant a little, and his thrusts were getting stronger and more erratic. “Girls are outperforming boys in all high school settings, and they’re being accepted to college nearly ten percent more.”

 

“I guess those are the right reasons?” Rey bit out before moaning a little. “Oh, god, right there Ben. Oh my- oh jesus!”

 

“Are you okay?” he asked, peering down at her.

 

“Yes!” she said, her head flopping from side to side on the silk lining of his suit jacket. “Oh- jesus, yes Ben!” 

 

It was a grand mal orgasm; it was an orgasm that made every embarrassment and inconvenience of this weekend worth it. Self-administered orgasms were great, but the body always  _ knew  _ it was coming. There was something about falling to pieces with another person that was, just frankly, spectacular. 

 

She could hear her own orgasm echoing back at her over the pond. Hopefully the alligator had been underwater and missed it- she didn’t want that prehistoric monster to think she was in some kind of death throe and come running. 

 

“Christ,” Ben said above her. It came out a bit strangled. 

 

He kept rocking against her, and Rey started to get her breath back. “Alright buddy,” she said after a while. “We’re in overtime, now.”

 

“Could you just not- you know, talk?” he said. 

 

She didn’t. Instead, Rey slid her fingers through the buttons of his dress shirt, found his nipple, and tweaked it. She remembered what he’s said about pain. Time to revisit the theory, eh?

 

It worked, because a few pinches later Ben was grinding his groin into hers, the cords of his neck standing out, and his abs twitching. 

 

“God,” he gasped when he rolled off her. 

 

“I thought you didn’t believe in god,” said Rey, listening to him pant. 

 

“This might make me rethink it,” said Ben. 

 

“Then I’ll take that as a compliment.”

 

“You should. You’re a very attractive woman.”

 

Rey waited for a rain of fire or the four horsemen, but they didn’t show up. Looked like Ben’ complimenting her  _ wasn’t  _ an omen of the end-of-days. Who’d have thunk it. 

 

~~~

 

“Christ, Rey,” said Ben as she trotted through their adjoining door and climbed up on his bed. 

 

I wasn’t planning on getting laid this weekend,” said Rey, running her hand down her flannel clad torso. “Honestly, I wasn’t planning on getting laid… ever.”

 

“I can tell,” said Ben. “Welders have worn thinner protective gear.”

 

“They aren’t that bad,” said Rey. She kind of liked the green and blue flannel set. 

 

“You could wear those instead of the lead-lined apron at an X-ray,” said Ben, tugging her legs into his lap. 

 

“Are you done?” asked Rey, picking up the remote and clicking on the TV. The man already had it on HGTV. Excellent. 

 

“For now,” said Ben. 

 

So… earlier,” said Rey, picking up the glass of wine Ben had already poured her. “When you said I was attractive. What did you mean?”

 

“Are you fishing for compliments?” Ben sighed, running his hand over the back of her calf. 

 

“Yes,” said Rey. “It’s been half a decade. Humor me.”

 

He turned a little bit to face her, his eyes narrowed in concentration. “Alright. You’re generally pleasing as a whole- everything in proportion. Shoulders the same width as your hips, which is increasingly unique. Your long muscles are defined but lean, which speaks to an adherence to fitness for health, and your skin is- flawless. It’s the first thing I noticed about you.”

 

“That sounds like something a serial killer would say,” Rey mumbled. 

 

“Your face is- stunning. Incredibly symmetrical, which people wrongly assume most faces are. Your mouth is full, each lip balancing the other, and your nose is narrow, but not in that artificial, aqualine way.  Your eyebrows help define your temples, relieving the strength of your jaw, and- you smell nice. You’re lovely.”

 

Rey was a  _ little  _ bit stunned. “Thank you,” she said. 

 

You’re welcome,” said Ben, taking a sip of wine and focusing on the television. 

 

This man… had hidden depths. 

 

“Want me to do you?” asked Rey. 

 

“No,” said Ben. 

 

“Of course you do, everyone liked to be complimented. Okay- your hair is- it’s excellent. It will never be a problem. In profile your nose is the focal feature of your face, which is fine for men, and yours is balanced by the ridge of your brow.” She traced each feature with a finger while she talked, and Ben’s dark eyes were focused on her, narrowed and wary. 

 

“Your shoulders are, frankly, phenomenal. They were the first thing I noticed about you. Strong and substantial without the bulk that comes with too much vanity and gym time. Your hands are lovely- I always notice how broad they are when you go to pick up a glass, because it ends up looking like a toy.”

 

Rey hadn’t realized that she’d spent this much time categorizing Ben, to be honest, but apparently it was paying off now.

 

“Your moles give your face character- no, I really like them,” said Rey. “And your penis-”

 

She could  _ feel  _ him snap to attention. 

 

“Your penis is… classically formed,” she said on a sigh.

 

“Classically formed?” asked Ben, one eyebrow up. 

 

“Oh yes,” sighed Rey, taking another sip of her wine. “Like a renaissance sculptor designed it, except a sculptor that was a woman and also of a generous heart. Mmm.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Oh, come on, Ben, you’ve been in locker rooms before. You have to have noticed.”

 

“Men spend all of their time trying not to see anyone else’s penis,” said Ben, sounding a little dazed. 

 

Rey grinned. “It curves ever so slightly upwards, which is great. That’s what you want. It does not, however, have a crook to the side, which in my experience is a modern epidemic.”

 

“Oh my god,” said Ben, looking like he’d been knocked on the head with a two-by-four. “You’re telling me Poe’s penis has a crook in it.”

 

Rey smirked and continued on. “It’s also just the right size. There’s no special prep work that needs to be done to enjoy your package, but it’s not so small that other measures need to be taken. And it’s- heavy. Just the right weight.”

 

“Weight?” asked Ben, sounding even more distant. 

 

“Oh yeah. Women are buying weighted dildoes these days. Even stainless steel massagers for in there, and those suckers are top of the line.”

 

“I- I-”

 

“You’re a very lucky man,” said Rey, snuggling back against him. 

 

“Thank you,” said Ben. 

 

“Honestly, it’s only the strength of your personality that’s keeping women away,” said Rey. “Because that dick is a good experience. But you need to talk less during sex. That was weird.”

 

“I was nervous,” said Ben, smoothing the blanket of Rey’s legs. 

 

“Me too. I was almost worried something wouldn’t function right.”

 

“Nope,” said Ben. “All parts in working order.”

 

“So why  _ have  _ you been out of relationships for a decade?” asked Rey, looking up at him. 

 

“Inertia,” said Ben. “This is much easier. And less dramatic.”

 

“So you don’t have a room full of tarantulas or something in your garage that scares away all comers?”

 

“No,” said Ben. “What’s with the questions?”

 

“I’m evaluating your potential as a recurring sexual partner,” said Rey. “We live close enough to each other, and we seem to have potential in that respect.”

 

“No,” said Ben, his hand briefly tightening on her ankle. “There is no ‘recurring’. There’s this weekend, and then- we go back.”

 

That stung. “Just like that?” said Rey. “You’ve just decided?”

 

“Yes,” said Ben. “My life is successfully balanced, and I’m hurtling towards old age with as much grace as I can muster. I don’t need all that turned upside down by a ‘recurring sexual partner.’”

 

“You aren’t even open to the possibility?” asked Rey. This hurt… a lot. She’d known there were no strings attached to the sex, but jesus. He wasn’t even pretending to consider it. He wasn’t playing nice. 

 

“No,” said Ben. “And I don’t think you are either.”

 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Rey. “I’m the one who brought this up.”

 

“No, I think- I think you probably are considering me for, what’s basically a “boyfriend” position,” he said, doing air quotes. “But I don’t think you’re actually interested in me. Well, maybe my penis. I think you’ve been alone your whole life, and you just want to fit with someone. And you like my mom.”

 

Ben yanked her legs out of his lap, rolled off the bed, and stalked over to their doors. “That’s too fucking far,” she said. She walked into her dark hotel room and then turned, rage and bile burning in her belly. Rey turned and glared at him. “You might have been right about a lot of stuff this weekend,” she said. “You may be right about how people are tribal animals, or how I’m persnickety and could stand to loosen up, but you’re wrong about this.

 

“I’ve been alone pretty much all of my life. That’s true. But I know- I  _ know _ \- when I’m lonely for someone to hug me, and lonely for someone to wake up in my bed next to me. Give me some fucking credit.”

 

She started to close the door, but he called out, “Wait- Rey. Just- come back, okay? Maybe- maybe you were right about some stuff too. Maybe I do need to keep my mind open, so that way when a possibility falls into a hay field on top of me, I don’t miss it. Okay?”

 

“No,” she said, squinching her eyes shut to hold off tears. “That fucking hurt, Ben. You  _ tried  _ to hurt me so I wouldn’t shake your little ordered world upside-down.”

 

“You’re right.”

 

“About?”

 

“About all of it, okay? I kissed you in the hay field to shut you up because it was too close to home. It hurts like hell to be the one fucked-up pot who can’t find a fucked-up lid to tolerate it. Okay? So can we just- can we end this weekend at least as friends?”

 

He looked hopeful and patted the bed next to him. 

 

“You never actually apologized,” said Rey, still holding the blanket around her like a shawl of external dignity. 

 

Ben ran a hand down his face. “I really am sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I said that you were going to use me as a family placeholder, or use me to get to my family.”

 

“Alright,” said Rey, shuffling back into the room and taking her place on the bed. “We can be friends for the weekend. Besides,” she said, taking a sip of her formerly abandoned wine. “I want to find out if they love it or list it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There probably aren’t any alligators in Athens, Georgia. However, I lived in an apartment complex in North Carolina that did have alligators in the retention ponds and lakes, and every so often they would scare the ever loving SHIT out of a visitor. It was great. 
> 
> I hope you're having as much fun reading this as I had writing it!


	3. Sunday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is just a brief little conclusion!

He snored. He fucking snored, but she somehow dealt with it, and when she woke up to housekeeping’s knocking she couldn’t find it in herself to mind that he’d shoved her head off of her own pillow. Maybe it had been five years since he’d shared a bed, too. 

 

Ben rattled off something in Spanish, and the knocking at the door stopped. He sat up, touching his face gingerly. “Why do I have a bloody nose?”

 

Rey vaguely remembered flailing at him; trying to get him to roll onto his side or smother to death, whichever stopped the snoring first. 

 

“No idea,” she said lightly. “Well, this was great. Thanks for everything, and I’ll- you know, just-”

 

“Yeah,” said Ben. “I’m going to shower and pack and go down to the farewell brunch.”

 

“Then I will see you there,” said Rey, thankful for the excuse to leave. He was cute, and unattainable, and suddenly she was ready to get back to her succulents and otherwise barren life. She could count on it. 

 

~~~

 

“Look at these poor bastards,” said Ben, watching over the top of his raised coffee mug as around them couples laughed and flirted (or spoke softly and wore sunglasses in the shade). “They’re acting like one weekend can repair everything. Marriage doesn’t change who people are, and a weekend away can’t just get rid of all your problems.”

 

“Nope,” said Rey, taking a long sip of her own latte. “I really think that the phrase, “A change is as good as a rest,” was just a way to trick the lower classes into requesting less paid time off.”

 

“Probably,” agreed Ben. “Or to convince them to take a different minimum wage job instead of actually agreeing to pay them enough to live.”

 

“Or to convince yourself that when you get back home you won’t want to bitch at your spouse for never picking up groceries when they need to, or not giving you blowjobs, or just resent them for not being able to meet every last one of your sexual, intellectual, and companionable needs.”

 

“There it is,” muttered Ben. “The truth.”

 

“Well, it is inane to expect  _ one person  _ to take care of every one of our complex requirements,” said Rey. 

 

“Is that why you support bisexual throuples?” asked Ben, hiding a grin behind a bite of eggs. “They can satisfy more of each other’s needs?

 

“Maybe,” mused Rey. She hadn’t really thought about it. “You know,” she said. “I haven’t been bitter about Poe since the alligator last night.”

 

“That sounds suspiciously timed and you should reconsider,” said Ben without missing a beat. 

 

“Probably,” said Rey.

 

They looked over the pastel-clad party goers, all laughing or preening or nursing a hangover. 

 

“It’s an hour back to the airport,” said Rey after a few minutes. 

 

“And we have to get gas,” said Ben. 

 

“The flight could leave early.”

 

“We only have five hours.”

 

“We should say our goodbyes.”

 

“Goodbye,” they said together, flatly, quietly, and with no real conviction. Nobody noticed. 

 

~~~

 

“You said you’d let me drive,” she said as Ben threw their luggage into the back of the shit-colored Fiat. Somehow it was even worse than she remembered it. 

 

“No, I said I’d think about it if we lived,” said Ben. “I thought about it. I want to drive.”

 

“Why?” asked Rey, trying to snatch the keys from him. 

 

“Because I want to continue to live.”

 

When Rey stood in front of the driver-side door with her arms crossed, Ben reaches out, took her waist, and moved her out of the way. 

 

“Hey!” she said as he slid into the space behind the wheel. 

 

“Just get in,” he said. 

 

“Fine,” Rey muttered, rounding the car. “You do know that women’s insurance rates are lower than men’s right? That means the people who do the math think we’re a lower liability.”

 

“But women get in the majority of accidents,” said Ben. 

 

They pulled off the winding driveway and left Corellia Hall behind. “Ah, but that’s likely because women typically do most of the school drop offs, grocery shopping, and pharmacy runs,” said Rey. “Those places are rife with fender benders and side-swipes of parked cars.”

 

“Yes, because women are the ones driving there,” said Ben. 

 

“No!” said Rey, triumphant. “It’s because school parking lots of are full of young drivers, and the others have really old drivers. I’d bet that most high-speed accidents involve dudes.”

 

“Maybe,” said Ben. “But I’m not willing to find out.”

 

“Fine,” said Rey. “I was just trying to be polite.” 

 

“You’re never polite,” said Ben. 

 

“I am so,” said Rey. “I always say ‘please and thank you’, I use table manners, and I tip appropriately. I left the housekeeper a twenty.”

 

“Why?” asked Ben. “She gets paid, and you only slept in your own bed one night.”

 

“She gets paid minimum wage to clean up human filth,” said Rey, making a horrified face at Ben. 

 

“Jesus, I know,” said Ben. “I tipped too, okay? You’re just- it’s too easy to horrify you.”

 

“You’re an ass,” said Rey. 

 

“Yeah, I really am,” said Ben, almost fondly. “I really am.”

 

~~~

 

They were booked next to each other on both planes. Both of them. The first flight wasn’t bad. Neither of them tried the animal crackers, and their layover in Atlanta was only thirty minutes. 

 

No, it was the flight back to D.C. that got a little ugly. 

 

There was a summer storm, the kind that pop up all the time on summer evenings when heat lightning crackles along the horizon. It’s all wet heat and cold, fresh air, and it was absolutely hell to fly through. 

 

The seatbelt sign went on somewhere over Virginia, and it didn’t go off until they landed. 

 

“What if we crash?” Rey asked as the plane hit an air pocket and dropped like a stone. 

 

“We aren’t going to crash,” said Ben. He wasn’t white knuckling the arms of his seat, but he wasn’t relaxed, either. 

 

“No, probably not,” Rey admitted. “But if it did- why would you care? Nothing matters, right?”

 

“We aren’t going to crash,” said Ben again, this time through clenched teeth. 

 

“But if there’s no hope, what’s the point of going on?” She wasn’t sure if she was asking Ben, or herself. 

 

“I don’t know,” okay?” said Ben. “I guess we all have hope. It’s the only thing that gets us out of bed half the time. You know, ‘Maybe today will be the day that I win the lottery, or my boss will notice how well I’m doing, or I’ll get a free eggroll with dinner’. People are always hoping, even if it’s stupid.”

 

“I think you’re right,” said Rey as the plane bounced again. 

 

They bounced around for a few more minutes before the captain announced their descent.

 

“You know,” said Ben. “I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of hearing that.”

 

“What?” asked Rey.

 

“That I’m right,” said Ben with a smirk. 

 

“You really are an ass,” said Rey on a sigh. 

 

Ben smiled a little as the wheels touched down. “I know.”

 

~~~

 

They shared a cab home. It was the most efficient thing to do.

 

~~~

 

Rey thought about unpacking her suitcase. She watered her plants, and sorted through the mail that had come over her two-day absence. She read her emails. She put on pajamas. 

 

Her life was  _ quiet.  _ She didn’t have anyone snoring, or arguing, or bitching about how expensive everything always is. 

 

Her life was ...not stimulating. 

 

But she had hope. Maybe things  _ could  _ change over one weekend away, because Ben really had shown her that: she had hope. Yeah, she was a little neurotic, and she was argumentative, and she wasn’t exactly a hot ticket item on the sexual marketplace, but she was open to opportunities.

 

She was resilient, dammit. 

 

Her doorbell chimed, and she knew who it was before she answered the door. 

 

It was Ben, looking sheepish in a black t-shirt and dark jeans. He didn’t say anything, and she didn’t either. 

 

They’d already said enough. 

 

With a little smile on her face, she stood back to let Ben in: Rey Johnson was open to opportunity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading my weird, almost-all-dialogue AU! It was such a fun, quirky writing exercise. <3 you reylos!


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